SEA MONSTERS, MERMAIDS, AND THE KRAKEN
PONTOPPIDAN, Erich.
The Natural History of Norway containing a particular and accurate Account of the Temperature of the Air, the different Soils, Waters, Vegetables, Metals, Minerals, Stones, Beasts, Birds, and Fishes; together with the Dispositions, Customs, and Manner of Living of the Inhabitants … In two Parts … Illustrated with Copper Plates, and a general Map of Norway.
London, for A. Linde, 1755.
Two parts in one vol., folio, pp. xxiii, [1], 206, with large folding map of Norway hand-coloured in outline and 12 engraved plates, wanting 2 original plates (depicting corals and minerals) which are supplied in smaller format from another edition mounted on a single leaf facing p. 168; vii, [1], 291, [13], with 14 engraved plates; very occasional light foxing, a little cockling; very good in near contemporary dark yellow paper-covered boards, vellum lettering-piece to spine, red edges; likely bound by Linde; some wear to corners, edges and spine ends; with ALS from Bill Macy of the Nantucket Historical Association (17 May 1932), his pencil inscription to Vilhjalmur Stefansson (May 1932), and book label of the Stefansson collection Dartmouth College Library to front endpapers, cancelled duplicate stamp to title verso.
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The Natural History of Norway containing a particular and accurate Account of the Temperature of the Air, the different Soils, Waters, Vegetables, Metals, Minerals, Stones, Beasts, Birds, and Fishes; together with the Dispositions, Customs, and Manner of Living of the Inhabitants … In two Parts … Illustrated with Copper Plates, and a general Map of Norway.
First English edition, a nice copy likely bound by the publisher Andreas Linde, of this remarkable account of Norway’s natural history by the Danish theologian and antiquary Pontoppidan (1698–1764), whose accounts of sea monsters influenced both Herman Melville’s Moby-Dick and Jules Verne’s Twenty thousand Leagues under the Seas.
First published as Det første Forsøg paa Norges naturlige Historie at Copenhagen in 1752–53, the work is divided into two parts. The first covers Norway’s ‘air’ (i.e. climate), ‘soils and mountains’, ‘waters’, ‘vegetables’, ‘sea-vegetables’, ‘gems and curious stones’, and ‘metals and minerals’, while the second describes its quadrupeds, serpents, insects, birds, fish, and sea monsters, ending with an ‘account of the Norwegian nation’.
Pontoppidan argues for the existence of sea serpents (‘the great sea-snakes I once held only for chimera, but am now fully convinced that they are found in the North sea, as sure as any other fish’ (II, p. 38)), of mermen and mermaids (‘as to the existence of the creature, we may safely give our assent to it’ (II, p. 187)), and of the kraken (‘the largest sea-monster in the world’ (II, p. 210)).
Provenance: presented by William F. Macy, President of the Nantucket Historical Association, to the Arctic explorer and ethnologist Vilhjalmur Stefansson (1879–1962), passing from him in 1952 to Dartmouth College Library.
ESTC 89156.
